Grammy found this cute Minnie Mouse for Brylee's birthday. I gave it to Brylee to sleep with and then went to get the camera to take a picture for Grammy. When I got back she wasn't just sleeping with it, she had to get up so she could really give it a good squeeze. Good find Grammy, you were right it is so soft and cuddley and already a favorite I think!

Time For the party! We had a Mickey Mouse themed party 'cuz that is Brylee's favorite show right now. The cake was simple, but fun and most importantly yummy! Grammy and Grampy came for dinner, presents, and cake. Brylee was thrilled to have them there for the party. She made off with quite a haul in the gift department and overall had a great day I think. I love celebrating my kids birthdays, what a fun day.

March 13, 2008. Brylee is two! She started off her big day excited to see that the 'birthday fairy' had brought balloons and the day just got better when mom let her lick the cake bowl!

March 8, 2008.

Carter, thanks for sharing your Birthday Party Favors even though we couldn't attend. The kids loved them!!! Hope you had a great party and Birthday!

It's a boy!!!!

Well we had our ultra sound today and they say it is 100% boy! So our numbers will be equal. But of course we don't have a name for a boy we only had a girl name picked out. So now we get to start that whole process again. They said the baby looked good, but is measuring 2 weeks big ( i hope that holds true) Who doesn't want to be done with pregnancy 2 weeks sooner than they thought they would be. But, as for now they are not going to change the due date they will just watch me and the baby and see how big it continues to measure. Anyways, that is our big news for the day. If anyone doubts the above statement, the proof is in the picture!! This kid has boy plumbing!!!

Liberty tried to instant message me today while I was at work. This is what she wrote, "dadwutryoudaooing." I thought that was pretty good!

Tonight during family home evening we learned about museums. We always start out FHE talking about what we did the last week that was fun or noteworthy. Brylee's answer for the past few weeks has been, "Grammy."

While learning about museums Liberty told us that things in a museum are from the "olden days". I asked each of the kids what somethings from the olden days are. Kayson and Liberty answered dinosaurs. Brylee answered, "Grammy." Then Liberty followed up by saying, "She's not from the olden days, she'd be dead if she was."

February 22, 2008

After looking at Elena's picture of melting snow and her grass starting to peek out, I'm jealous! Kayson has been asking me for two weeks now when we'd be able to see the grass. I keep telling him it will be awhile yet. We are definately melting around here, but as of Friday this is as far as the warmer temps have gotten us. And then this morning (Sunday) we woke up to another couple of inches before it warmed up enough to quit sticking to the ground. Maybe spring will come this year, I'm not holding my breath though.

I have no idea where Brylee got the idea to drink out of the kitchen sink like this. It was so funny to watch her try to breathe and get a drink at the same time. Water kept going up her nose and so she'd have to stand up and then say, "More drink" and "my nose, my nose". Then she'd take some really deep breathes and go back in for more.

February 14, 2008.

We found and oompa loompa at our house today. Isn't she just cute! She really enjoyed her valentines lunch of spaghetti. Her eyebrows were orange most of the day:)

February 6, 2008.

I think this picture shows our snow at it's deepest this year. The pathway where the kids are standing is up to Brylee's armpits. There is still probably three inches packed underneath them. The picture of the tree probably shows the depth the best (at least if you've ever seen this tree in real life). Kade's guess is that the snow is three feet deep against the tree. It has been one crazy winter.

February 1, 2008

The tempuratures have finally warmed up enough for the kids to play outside ( if you call 20's warm). You can see the kids were up to there knees in snow, but the crazy thing is that the snow was twice that deep the kids were just too light to sink any further!

It happened, AGAIN! Today we went to Idaho Falls to get some stuff from Lowes for our house. Deidra went to the store alone with the kids for about an hour while I went to an appointment. The entire time she had to keep telling the kids to stop climbing on and under stuff.

I met them at the store when my appointment was over and we were finishing up our shopping. Deidra had to go back to the back of the store and while she was back there Kayson was playing under one of their large roll around ladders. As he was stepping out he tripped and fell flat on his head. Then came the "SCREAM" as Deidra is walking back to the isle she sees about 3 people start to rush over to see what happened and tells them, "It's not as serious as it sounds" before she had even seen the wound. She just didn't want them to all come over and make us fill out accident reports.

We're at Grammy's house today and she made us all a treat. S'mores! Who doesn't love them? I thought I would just share these photos with you all from our S'mores.

These are the kid's bowls...

and this is Grammy's bowl. Notice the size difference.

Lately at work one of my co-workers has been talking about how everything at BYU-Idaho is copying the way Macintosh uses "i", but yet they use the excuse that it's the "i" in Idaho that they are using. For example there is the iMedia center and so forth.

Well there is definately a culture movement with the iPod and iMac and a few other iThings. However, I didn't think that it would influence a 2-year old the way that it has influenced Brylee. She is so hip. Lately she has been using the following phrases:

iJumping - When she's jumping around.
iBouncing - When she isn't jumping around.
iFalling - After she lays down
iRunning - As she tries to keep up with Liberty and Kayson
iGot iT- Whenever she accomplishes something
iKonking - She started konking her head on the TV when I pointed out the pretty flowers on President Hinckley's casket.
iEating - This comes before...
iDone - See cereal post below.

January 29, 2008.
I told Brylee that she needed to finish her breakfast this morning and then she could get in the tub. "o-tay" she says. A couple of minutes later she comes back "i'n done". I said you're already done? That was fast!! Then I go to clean up her spot and find this. I wouldn't exactly call it done, but she did empty her bowl! What a goof.

Liberty and Deidra have been following the Miss America pageant on TLC for the past week. Today they watched Miss Congeniality together. The show is about an undercover cop who thinks some bad people are going to try and kill the pageant winner by placing a bomb in the crown so she enters the competition to try and thwart their plan.

Just now I was in the family room preparing a lesson for church tomorrow. Liberty walked in the room and was frantically looking for Kayson. I told her that he went to bed and all she said was, "Oh." Then she sat down on the couch and looked around the room like she didn't know where she was. I asked her if she was awake and received no response. So I took her back to bed.

After she laid down, this was our conversation:

Me: What were you going to tell Kayson?
Liberty: I was going to tell him about the crown.
Me: What about the crown?
Liberty: I was going to tell him there is a bomb in it.
Me: Was he going to wear it?
Liberty: Uh huh, that's why I have to tell him not to put it on.

She then rolled over and never looked like she had even been out of bed. I guess she has my wonderful talent of talking in her sleep.

Yesterday I went out to our shed to shut the door because it had been left open. I was afraid that the door was going to be frozen open and I wouldn't be able to shut it. I pulled the door a couple of times to jar it loose from the ice. I was quite pleased that it actually shut.

I started to walk away from the shed, then thought to myself, "Wait a minute! Something didn't look right back there." I went back to the shed and well...all I can say is cheap Sears metal sheds aren't built for Rexburg winters!

I started to look around online and it look as though lots of people who live in snowy climates have had the same problem. About 6 inches of snow is all these things can handle. Who would have thought? Obviously not me. The other thing I found out is that there is a roof strengthening kit that you can purchase, but no where in the instructions for the shed is that mentioned. I guess you have to have a "beta" shed to figure it out the hard way.

Last night I had a church ball game that lasted about 2 hours because there were a million fouls. I didn't get home till about 10:50. When I got home, Deidra informs me that Liberty had just thrown up and she couldn't deal with the smells of cleaning it up. So I stayed up till about 12:45 doing laundry and making sure Liberty was ok. Then Brylee woke up about 4 times in the night every 1 1/2 hours. So I was dead tired to start the day off.

Yesterday's thought was "why does life always seem to be so fun?" Today's thought was, "You've got to be kidding me!" The day started out well. I served at the temple as a parking lot attendant and the weather was the best we've had in a long time. However, the instant I got home Deidra says, "The heater isn't working again."

Last winter right after a real cold snap our heater stopped working because the gas valve had junk built up in it. This time it was showing the exact same symptoms. Only the fan would kick on and no fire. Well, Deidra called United Plumbing and Heating and they wouldn't be able to look at it till Monday. We didn't want frozen pipes so we called back and asked if they had our part in stock. Turns out, someone else had ordered the part yesterday, then called back and said they didn't need it. I'm thinking, "Awesome, what a blessing for us!"

So I ran over to the store and picked the part up for $79.95. Had to defrost the main gas valve on the outside of the house (a few taps with a hammer) to shut of the gas. Then I tore the old gas valve off. I couldn't get a part off the old one because it had ceased on. So I had to go back to the store and use their vise to get the part off to transfer to the new gas valve. Finally I got everything installed and turned the heater back on...or so I thought. Nothing! So then I got to looking at the thermostat. Liberty had flipped the switch from heat to cool. No wonder why the heater wasn't working, it wasn't supposed to be. On the bright side, we have a new gas valve and the old one was wearing out anyways.

What a fabulous Sunday we had today. It all started out with Liberty being a grump from the moment she woke up. She wouldn't move faster than a snail. We barely made it to church on time. All through Sacrament meeting Brylee kept wanting to sit with Dad then Mom. Of course, we were on opposite sides of the bench so she had to crawl over Kayson and Liberty. Everytime she'd crawl over Kayson, we'd here him say "Ow, BRYLEE!" Then she kept passing gas that made me keep having to check her diaper, but nothing appeared. I think she has Huidini diapers. I know the people in front of us had to just keep thinking, "Why don't you take that kid out and change her diaper?"

After the the rest hymn sung by the choir, Kayson got an excited look on his face and said, "PRAYER?". I had to tell him, "No, it's not time for primary yet." Then when it was time for primary he started crying because he didn't want to go.

At the end of church, one of the primary leaders brought Liberty to Deidra just bawling. Liberty would not tell her what was wrong. Later, we found out from our home teacher that Liberty was so upset because they did not sing to her for her half-birthday. At school they are celebrating her half-birthday this week because her b-day is in the middle of summer. She gets to hand out treats and have PE dance class So she thinks that you always get a big celebration for your half-birthday.

November 5, 2007
Tonight we had a FHE lesson on the Bill of Rights. We were talking about one of the ammendments that had to do with war time and so we were explaining if we were in a war . . . . .
Liberty pipes up with 'we are in a war'. At this point I'm thinking wow, my kids up with current affairs! Then I ask her, we are in a war? 'Ya we're in the 2nd war' (ie we're in the Rexburg 2nd Ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) We couldn't help but laugh it was so cute!